Preparation of metal (Ti, Zn and Ca) modified Ni2P catalysts and HDS performance and kinetic studies

• Metal X modified Ni2P (X = Ti, Zn and Ca) catalysts have been successfully prepared.
• X can promote the formation of smaller and highly dispersed Ni2P particles.
• Addition of X into bulk Ni2P can significantly increase the surface area.
• The DBT HDS activity was improved significantly by addition of X into bulk Ni2P.
• Pseudo-second-order model is suitable for describing the reaction kinetics.

Metal X modified Ni2P catalysts (X–Ni2P, where X represents the Ti, Zn and Ca) with high hydrodesulfurization (HDS) activity were described. The as prepared catalysts were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), N2-adsorption specific surface area measurements (BET), CO uptake, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and the effect of different metals on dibenzothiophene (DBT) HDS performance over the Ni2P catalyst was investigated. The incorporation of X can increase the surface area and promote the formation of smaller and highly dispersed Ni2P particles. The Ti–Ni2P catalyst exhibited the highest DBT HDS activity of 98.0%, which was an increase of 36% when compared with that found for bulk Ni2P. In addition, the kinetics for the DBT HDS over Ti–Ni2P catalyst was studied. The results showed that pseudo-second-order model is suitable for describing the reaction kinetics of the DBT HDS over Ti–Ni2P catalyst. The activation energy and the pre-exponential factor were 152.2 kJ·mol−1 and 1.48 × 1014 s−1, respectively.